Today, as personal computers (PCs) continue to achieve higher levels of performance at an affordable price, increased numbers of people are turning to a PC as a means to view multimedia content. For example, multimedia content can include analog and/or digital signals that provide video and/or audio information. Thus, examples of multimedia content include cable television feeds provided by cable service providers, video information provided by DVD players, video information provided by digital video recorders, and/or video information stored in PCs.
Multimedia content is typically protected using one or more forms of content protection in order to control access to the content (e.g., to prevent unauthorized viewing and/or copying). Content protection can take various forms (e.g., digital rights management, copy protection, etc.) and include varying levels of protection. For example, some content protection includes the ability to limit the number of copies of a multimedia file that can successfully be made, prevent all copying of the multimedia file, and/or prevent sharing of the multimedia file. Other types of content protection place limitations on where the multimedia file can be played, e.g., only on one specific computer, or several computers having a common owner. Typically, the level of content protection is chosen as a function of the intended specific application. For example, distribution of a pre-release first-run movie typically uses a very high level of protection, because a single breach of the content protection scheme could have devastating effects. Conversely, streaming video including syndicated re-runs of a popular television show typically uses a lower level of protection because the goal of the content protection is to prevent widespread copying, rather than a single instance of copying.